Comparison of PD BLADE with fat saturation (FS), PD FS and T2 3D DESS with water excitation (WE) in detecting articular knee cartilage defects.

Abstract The purpose of this study, is to compare the sequences: 1) proton density (PD) BLADE (BLADE is a PROPELLER-equivalent implementation of the Siemens Medical System) with fat saturation (FS) coronal (COR), 2) PD FS COR, 3) multi-planar reconstruction (MPR) with 3 mm slice thickness and 4) multi-planar reconstruction (MPR) with 1.5 mm slice thickness, both from the T2 3D-double-echo steady state (DESS) with water excitation (WE) sagittal (SAG), regarding their abilities to identify changes in the femorotibial condyle cartilage in knee MRI examinations. Thirty three consecutive patients with osteoarthritis (18 females, 15 males; mean age 56 years, range 37–71 years), who had been routinely scanned for knee examination using the previously mentioned image acquisition techniques, participated in the study. A quantitative analysis was performed based on the relative contrast (ReCON) measurements, which were taken both on normal tissues as well as on pathologies. Additionally, a qualitative analysis was performed by two radiologists. Motion and pulsatile flow artifacts were evaluated. The PD BLADE FS COR sequence produced images of higher contrast between Menisci and Cartilage, Fluid and Cartilage, Pathologies and Cartilage as well as of the Conspicuousness Superficial Cartilage and it was found to be superior to the other sequences (p